The Climate Neutral Certified roster now includes over 90 brands, large and
small, that have been verified to have measured and offset their carbon
footprint, and are taking other concrete actions to combat climate change —
including many darlings of the sustainable products scene, such as Allbirds,
Peak
Design,
outdoor footwear brand
Icebug,
Numi Organic Tea and brand strategy firm thinkPARALLAX, to name a
few.

Climate Neutral Certified is one of the first in the landscape of certifications and
labels to directly address a brand’s commitment to halting climate change. By
earning the Climate Neutral certification, these 90+ brands are leading by
example and accepting full accountability for their carbon footprint.

“Climate Neutral Certified companies show the world that immediate action on
climate change is necessary and possible,” says Austin Whitman, CEO of
Climate Neutral. “Even under challenging business conditions, our first group of
brands has stayed committed to solving the climate crisis by directing precious
resources toward reducing and offsetting their emissions. We’re proud to be
creating a standard for companies’ claims to carbon responsibility, and thrilled
at what this group of forward-thinking, responsible brands has achieved.”

To earn the certification for 2020, companies must complete a three-step
process:

Verifiably measure their greenhouse gas footprint from making and delivering
their products in 2019,

Purchase carbon credits to offset their entire footprint, and

Implement strategies to reduce future emissions.

Certification lasts for a year before companies must repeat the process.

Because certified companies must buy carbon credits to offset their footprint,
the certification imposes a fee for every ton of carbon emissions. This approach
funnels significant investment into carbon reduction and sequestration projects
around the globe, and accomplishes carbon
pricing
— which economists believe is necessary to address the climate crisis.

To date, Climate Neutral reports:

161,000 tons of carbon offset from 2019 business operations

$800K+ paid by Certified businesses to reduce or sequester carbon
around the world

$700M+ — the combined total revenue of Climate Neutral Certified brands
in 2019

Undergoing the certification process has been an invaluable learning experience
for some of the participating companies.

“The Climate Neutral Certification process has been an educational process for
our entire team and a really good exercise in distilling our climate action into
something that is measurable, trackable and accountable,” said Gihan
Amarasiriwardena, co-founder and President at apparel brand Ministry of
Supply.

“The measurement process is critical
— and it challenged our many of our preconceived notions of what is sustainable
from a GHG perspective and allowed us to isolate the biggest opportunities for
improvement including our material choices, milling process and shipping
methods. When you can measure the difference between various choices, you can
design in a lower footprint.”

“Climate Neutral certification pushed us to accelerate our GHG management effort
from an annual measure-and-report mode to a cross-functional, on-going effort
across our business. It has been an eye-opening endeavor for everyone involved,
and our staff have voiced great pride that Klean is making this commitment,”
said Danielle Cresswell, Senior Sustainability Manager at Klean
Kanteen. “We now have a climate team comprised
of staff from Supply Chain, Engineering, Product, Operations, Marketing, and
Sustainability who are tasked with advancing and implementing Klean’s emissions
reduction strategy.

“We still have a lot of work to do; but looking at our 15-year emissions
model, it is clear we need big, bold steps within our business and our greater
supply chain to see meaningful emissions reductions,. It’s going to take
collaboration with industry partners, as well as significant improvements by
much larger companies in the transportation and materials production sectors. In
the interim, we need to figure out how to invest in carbon offset projects that
can also bring down emissions in our own supply chain.”

Several Climate Neutral Certified companies expressed the importance of
maintaining and highlighting brands’ climate-change efforts, especially while
that other global crisis is consuming everyone’s attention.

“In some ways, the climate crisis is analogue to the current pandemic we’re
experiencing,” Jonathan Cedar, CEO of
BioLite + co-founder of Climate Neutral, told
Sustainable Brands via email. “At the beginning of the COVID-19
crisis,
we looked at it with ambivalence and non-action, as if it were someone else’s
problem. Now we’re all in it together in a very serious way. It’s my hope that
Climate Neutral can mobilize the business community to get in front of the
coming climate crisis.”

“The MiiR team is incredibly proud of becoming Climate Neutral Certified.
From the commitment by leadership to all-company learning sessions, every
individual has engaged in the process in some way, shape or form,” said
Charlie Clark, Director of Impact at MiiR. “When we
joined in 2019, we were focused on our company’s drive to help create a better
future for people around the world. Now, even though the global landscape is
dramatically different, we recognize that responsibility carries even more
weight.

“We believe it’s critical to support communities in times of crisis, whether
that be serving immediate needs or helping ensure a stable planet for
generations to come. The Climate Neutral Certified label has allowed every MiiR
employee to stand up and point to something specific and say, ‘this is why I
work here.’ This is the perfect place to start for any brand looking to take
internal action on climate.”